and when you were born
your birth multiplied
each child in our family reborn as your brother
daddy reborn as your father
i reborn as your mother

my joy lives outside of me
it is wrapped up in
each of my children
in my husband
in our family

the undefined space where boundaries of self and other don’t quite make sense
that is where love resides
that space is what matters
and i feel that so strongly
as i watch you
being kissed
on the nose
by your big brothers

a walk in the woods
soaking in the synergy of sun and snow
in between breaths i hear the occasional sound
of snow falling from trees
and i keep thinking there is something
following me

and maybe there is

i come home to the sounds of guitar strumming
and wild squeals of joy
daredevil antics
that your brothers will share with you
much too early for a mother’s liking
and there are screeches of frustration
when the needs of young boys are not met
by each other
by me
by circumstance

needs so great that it is impossible
for a young boy to move past them

and soon you will  give us the gift of your presence
and your needs  so great that it will be impossible
for anyone to move past them

and with that
we will all be so very present in each second of our day
we will stop and watch you just breathe
and we will all sigh
at the miracle
of
just
being
alive

i look forward to that
and i thank you also for giving me these last moments of sun and snow and silence
and the sounds of our family

A little tedium to make a point:

I organize our photos by season.   I give three months to each season.  That makes for even proportions, which appeals to my former math teacher self.   I realize this organizational strategy is a little optimistic in the assumptions it makes about how long certain seasons actually last up here in the high country.  The three months I relegate to autumn are September, October and November.    Calling November an autumn month is a stretch.  A long stretch.   Now, take a look at this assortment of photos, each taken from a separate outdoor adventure from this year’s autumn photo folder (and mind you we have not even reached the end of October).

Is the presence of snow remarkably evident to any one else?  Ah yes, it has been a wintery fall in these parts.  We’ve shoveled on the last day of summer, picked pumpkins from 6 inches of snow in 20 degree weather, and today we sledded in over a foot  of the white wet stuff as we watch the snow continue to fall.  Duchess Autumn is doing a miserable job keeping the Snow Queen at bay.  But we aren’t complaining, just reveling in the silence that is unique to a fresh snow fall, followed by the song of a sunny post-snow day.

Well I never expected it to take this long to get to the second principle of from David Sobel’s book, Childhood and Nature.  (For more on where this started, visit here and here).  But, life gets crazy and, interestingly enough, it seems that I am revisiting the second principle of this investigation just when it seems to be reaching a heightened relevance to our own lives, so this will provide the opportunity to write a bit about how we are doing this kindergarten at home thing, for those of you that are curious.

So what do Fantasy and Imagination have to do with fostering a love of nature and earnest desire to care for the earth?  Everything!  Sobel opens a discussion of the second principle with a tale of his own family’s voyage to a castle laden land.  He recounts how an agenda of tours and history lessons snuffed the flame of his childrens’ interest, which, fortunately, was re-lit by a magical storyteller and the opportunity for the children to freely explore and create their own magical world amongst the castle walls, independent of historical accuracy .  I bet this scenario is familiar to us all, where interest wanes when teaching begins.  It is perhaps our agenda to teach about the earth and our failure to prioritize fantastic and  imagined interpretations of our surroundings that defeats our most valiant efforts to foster an appreciation of nature.

The power of imagination is central to our  family’s exploration of nature.  Sobel’s ideas resonate strongly with our approach, which derives from intuition and our chosen homeschool philosophy, Enki.  Enki rightly views the world as being unimaginably vast and larger than what can be conceived of through the senses, and while the senses of observation are regarded as invaluable, they are not regarded as the only tools for understanding what is around us.  Enki includes imagination, intuition and insight as other vital senses that help us understand the world.  This may be a tough leap for us traditionally educated adults to make–we learn about the world through science, and science is about observation!  But if we stretch a bit we can see how  these vital senses are the foundation of most spiritual, artistic and scientific advances.  Indeed the sun would likely still be revolving around the earth if Galileo had not employed his senses of imagination, intuition and insight.  It is easy to see how these senses were essential to all great discoveries.*

Now back to our world of little people.  If we can accept imagination as a sense used to understand  what we experience, it is easy to  see how  central it is to the understanding of the natural world, for, hopefully, all of us have experienced the magic of a walk in the woods.  To appreciate the natural world, children must feel an emotional connection to the complex phenomena that define the workings of the natural world.  Children can “see” these phenomena as  the work of living forces.  While King Summer ushers in summer with his demanding presence, calling out for his symphony of bird song,  Duchess Autumn, with a quiet but powerful magic, tosses out gentle breezes turning corn golden,  setting the forests ablaze, and calling the sun down to an early night’s rest. *

As we walk through the forest this fall, we look for the work of Duchess Autumn.  The hunt for her comes alive.  We can feel her in the chilly air, we see where she has painted the forest.  We also notice where King Summer is lingering  longer, where the leaves are still green, where the birds still sing, where the sun still beats strong.  These characters create a far greater presence of nature to our wee folk than a discussion of the ins and outs of why the seasons change .  The time will come to understand how it all works, but the seeds of appreciation must be laid in the fertile bed of imagination.

Sobel succinctly states “our role as storytellers and world creators precedes our role as imparters of knowledge and cultural heritage.” May we all tell many stories and create worlds anew every day.

there is this!

the last day of summer was grand, in a very un-summery sort of way:

making snow fall

and cleaning it up.

The wee folk were very happy to wake to an earth flocked in snow!

A conversation with a dear friend about her love of collages

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A request for a photo of E-man with short hair

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Another summer of big transitions

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A long awaited return to smooth days and smiling faces after some weeks of rough waters

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A picture post for the grandparents and other folks curious about the growing and stretching of the wee folk in our tribe.

The fields are painted with the palette of summer.  Hidden amongst the wildflowers are glimpses of the goodness to come.  In this time, when the seasons are turning,  I am simultaneously filled up with gratitude for what has been and anticipation of what is to come.  The miracle of life is so evident.

Happy September!

We’ve relocated.  In our new surroundings we are living on top of our neighbors, surrounded by wilderness. This arrangement requires a new approach to how and where we play outdoors while at home, which has sent us searching for our own best secret place–a little hideaway to walk to that we can call our  “backyard”.

We found it.  Complete with rocks to climb, sweet aspen groves, and enclaves of pines to protect us in the winter.  But the best part is the little creek, possibly spring fed (we have more investigating to do), that gurgles as it creeps down the the valley.  It is more that we could have every hoped for.  So just as E-man requested, we’ll be going back every day. And maybe, this special place will be just what we need to get inspired to share, once again, the treasures of our days here at connected at the  roots.

So we have been thinking a bit about kinesthetic adventure–how to invite the boys to engage their whole bodies in play at home, where things aren’t as wild.  We live in a borrowed space, so our options for altering our landscape are limited.  Whatever we do, we need to be able to take it with us.  We have started collecting pieces of the forest to find a new  life, with us.

We are being very lazy about the whole thing, just creating piles around the yard to be discovered.   In the end, I think the laziness pays off.  The boys are left with a little more room to invent uses for their forest tools.

Tree limbs become buildings,  balance beams and pieces of ever-changing obstacle courses.

Rocks become lizard homes, foundations and cairns marking a trail.

We have forgone the sandbox, entirely, in exchange for a free-for-all opportunity to dig wherever, jut like the badgers do.

I am pretty sure our forest-scrap strewn yard is a whole lot more fun.  It provides  mystery.  Mystery that a green lawn and a  landscaped yard just can’t compete with.  There is an open invitation to create and sculpt.  Instead of spending time in a mono-textured sand, the boys encounter rocks,  worms, old bottle caps and bones.  Instead of moving across a sanded wood surface, they get scraped and poked as they build with rough-barked tree limbs.  Instead of having a play-structure with a fixed purpose, their play structure can be created anew every day.  Pretty, well it isn’t pretty.  But it is adventurous!  Though I sometimes yearn to be able to stay put for a while so that we can grow and love our own space,  for now I am grateful for the limitations of our borrowed yard and mobile playscape.

In a different direction of finding adventure in not-so-wild places, I have fallen in love with the playgrounds encountered in Germany by the little travelers.  Really, you should take a few minutes to check out these parks.  I have park envy.